Tag: Justin Bieber

Saturday Night Live, aka SNL, featured Ronda Rousey and muical guest Selena Gomez (who also took part in the “Bland Guy” skit), along with Kate McKinnon doing her brilliant Justin Bieber, and Tina Fey reprised her spot on impression of Sarah Palin.

Saturday Night Live, aka SNL, featured Ronda Rousey and muical guest Selena Gomez (who also took part in the “Bland Guy” skit), along with Kate McKinnon doing her brilliant Justin Bieber, and Tina Fey reprised her spot on impression of Sarah Palin. Despite a fairly good open, with the Palin/Trumbo double act, episode 1694 had more misses than hits. Even the studio audience, who braved a blizzard to attend, seemed more bemused than amused.

Once the political mickey-take was over, Rousey began her monologue which needed all the help it could get. While Ronda is a personal favorite, her open was almost painful to watch as the cast worked overtime to make it funny.

Missed Opportunity:

So. Selena Gomez is the musical guest on SNL. Kate McKinnon does a wicked good impression of Gomez’s old flame Justin Bieber. During Rousey’s painful to watch open, Bieber is trotted out (and slapped making this bit the best part of the monologue, hands down) and then exits before Gomez is introduced for a mini-musical number. Why, oh why, could there not have been a McKinnon/Bieber and Gomez moment during the open? Too soon? Too late? Answers on a postcard please, or in comments below…

Best bit of Ronda’s monologue; The Bieber smackdown…

The monologue was followed by a brilliant satirical sketch where the “White-Oscars” and the “Black Boycott” took “best in show” for comedy. A number of African-American themed films were trotted out for nominations and in each case it was the white performer in each film that got the nod.

As the film’s were listed, each caucasian actor’s role got smaller, and more insignificant, for each “movie” (One actor being nominated for “unknown male voice on phone.”) By the end of the skit, all of the non-African-American nominees had won. SNL at it’s topical best. Sadly, the rest of the episode was not as funny, or spot on.

The Color White…Or possibly a Reservoir Dogs reunion…

The next skit was the BAMM (Bullies Against Mixed Martial Arts, which should have been BAMMA surely?) and the whole thing had a Carrie-ish slant. While Ronda was “Carrie” there was no pig’s blood moment and the only destruction was that of the main bully’s face (Vanessa Bayer). It was amusing in a very limited way.

Next up was “Bland Guy” (a spoof on The Bachelor) another “miss” for all intents and purposes. While a number of female cast members, and Rousey, plopped on a bench next to “Bland Guy” Beck Bennett, the gags ran from okay to tepid. One of the best gags of the set utilized the very much underused and stunning Sasheer Zamata, and made what seemed to be another reference to the Oscars. Zamata sits down and Beck’s character asks who she is:

“I’m the black one…”

The best part of the whole sketch had musical guest Selena Gomez showing up and making a joke about being conceived during the second season of the 25 year-old show. “Bland Guy” immediately choses the young woman after she reveals who she is.

I’ll take this one…

This sketch served as an intro to Gomez’ first musical number and armed with a slit dress and sexy demeanor, the singer proved, beyond a shadow of doubt, that she is all grown up. Sultry and sexy, the singer has easily moved from teen performer to impress those old enough that acne is no longer an issue.

Other comedic misfires included the party invitation skit which felt completely off and a bit like an attempt to recreate the “Wild and Crazy Guys” persona of Steve Martin and Martin Short, but without the “European” or comic flair.

Clear comedic miss…

The last three skits; a superhero one, where each “hero” demands their introduction time while the city is destroyed and each character’s superpowers diminish in importance/relevance, and a teen boy whose sexual exploits with two teachers has his day in court, were fairly tame and also misses. The town hall meeting sketch also felt flat and uninspired.

Close but no cigar…

Perhaps the one skit that made the audience, who braved the winter storm to attend the live show, fairly uncomfortable was the one with Pete Davidson as the teenager who was “seduced” by two teachers. The jokes took a long time to reach the audience and in terms of taste, this one was quite probably a bit too close to the bone for the studio viewers.

Questionable skit…

Selena Gomez ended the show with another sexy number, both costume-wise and song-wise. Sadly, Tina Fey turning up and doing her “Palen” was not enough to save this episode. Kudos for the Oscar sketch though and major points for having Gomez sing. It is a shame that they did not allow for a McKinnon “Bieber” face-off with Selena though…

It really looks like SNL upped their comedic game on Saturday with host James Franco, with his BFF Seth Rogen popping in for a couple of cameos, and the writers of the show outdid themselves by picking on Kim Kardashian via Nicki Minaj in their Weekend Update portion of the episode. The 31 year old rapper came out as Kim, complete with long hair and boobs that threatened to pop out of her top, to speak to the anchor Colin. In the skit, Kardashian is upset about that photoshoot and she claims that everything has been taken out of context.

Taylor Swift is a lot of things, beautiful, talented, a singer who rules the charts and whose fans adore her, she is now proving that she might just have a talent for comedy when she dressed down to be on Jimmy Fallon’s Tonight Show. The 24 year-old singer is playing dressup, or down, to appear on the comedy sketch “teen show” EW! and she’ll be joining the ranks of Seth Rogen and Zac Efron who have already shown up on the “program.”

Like an addict who cannot keep away from drugs, Selena Gomez is just incapable of turning away from the mess that is Justin Bieber and now it’s Gomez vs Demi Lovato as another one bites the dust. Another one as in one more gal pal of the 21 year-old performer has fallen by the wayside as Selena refuses to leave the bad boy of bubble gum pop alone.

Move over Miley Cyrus, Kendall Jenner with her commando look at the MMVA looks like she may “wannabe” the next big risque thing on the Internet. Just a little FYI to Miley, sister Kylie Jenner is not too far behind her daring older sister in the “lets show off more skin” trend. At the MuchMusic Video Awards for 2014, the two Instagram-loving girls changed no less than four times for the event.